Educating an Environmental Elite: The Training of the Indian Forest Service

Abstract

The Indian Forest Service is an elite environmental civil service and in this paper I analyse the current education and training which a member of the Indian Forest Service receives. Following a discussion of my ethnographic research methodology, I demonstrate that the training of the Indian Forest Service instils a hierarchical, authoritarian culture which prevents the new, more sensitive forest policies such as Joint Forest Management (JFM) from being implemented. The actual work that the forest officer is expected to undertake may have changed beyond recognition, but the recruitment and training methods have not and remain more concerned with maintaining the esprit de corps of the service. Re-training courses for personnel are currently being held at the National Institute of Rural Development in Hyderabad but many more are needed. I conclude by recommending that new Indian Forest Service probationers need to be taught less discipline and more social sensitivity in line with their changing role.